


Amicicide

by InaccessibleRail



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: AU, Angst, F/M, Grief/Mourning, M/M, Mental Instability, Mild Gore, Post Reichenbach, Unresolved Romantic Tension, Unresolved Sexual Tension, Violence, not compliant with s3, wherein things get grim
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-12-30
Updated: 2014-01-14
Packaged: 2018-01-06 16:47:44
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 9,988
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1109184
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/InaccessibleRail/pseuds/InaccessibleRail
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Separated by death but still obsessed with one another; John tries to get on with life, Sherlock tries to get back to it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue & Epilogue: Proof by Contradiction

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> John never used to dream this vividly unless it was about the war. Dreams so striking they were only granted at the price of disquietude. His dreams stayed with him throughout the day, the residual emotions too difficult to shake. “You should write them down,” Ella said, as if that ever solved anything.  
> He did it anyway.
> 
> * * *
> 
> More and more often Sherlock got the impression that he was merely observing himself act. That he was, to a greater or lesser degree, only present in part. But he could never recall where the other parts of his consciousness went when that happened. Other aspects of his mind seemed to have been taken over by uncontrollable forces as well. Some thoughts felt foreign and intrusive to him - it was like having a conversation with yourself but not getting a word in edgewise.

  
March, 2012

  
This is it. The worst and best nightmare I have. (It’s only a nightmare once I’m awake. If I didn’t wake up it would be perfect.)

I think it happens only in a state of half-consciousness, and the fact that I’m dreaming slithers and flutters right at the edges of my comprehension, like a moth trying to break through a windowpane.

I manage to talk you down.

I say something I didn’t say before, and even though your mind is made up you give in, you come down. You don’t fall, you turn around, still on the phone with me, and you go back inside the building.

I meet you halfway. I hug you, and I think: _what did I say?_ What was it that I failed to tell you, that would have saved your life? I rack my brain for this even as I’m dreaming, even as I have my arms around you. (What could I possibly have said? What did you want me to say, Sherlock?)

I ask you: what was it, Sherlock? That made you change your mind? And you mumble something unintelligible - something like, ‘I don’t know’ or ‘I can’t remember’, but it’s all right for now. With you pressed close, your cold face against my cheek, against my neck; it’s fine, it’s all right.

(Until it’s not. And I’m awake.)

 

 

*

  
It was a bit absurd, how difficult certain things became. John would often complain about that, quietly to himself - grumbling, one might call it - but it never seemed to help much. Things like, getting out of bed in the morning when he wasn’t going to the surgery; like deciding what to eat when nothing he could think of had any appeal; like doing something other than contemplate the empty air directly in front of him when he had no other plans for the day.

But he took care, even when he rather wouldn’t. He made toast in the morning, (the way he himself liked it, and no one else—telling himself not to think about it.) He drank coffee and hoped it would revive him, (taking out only one cup from the cupboard—telling himself not to think about it.) And it wasn’t so much the taste that appalled him, more the consistency of the bread that turned into a sticky, expanding mass in his mouth – and the coffee with its bitterness ever on the verge of lurching up the same way it came down, somehow always managing to lose all its heat before he’d had his second sip. It was the unpleasant way it all settled in his stomach. Fighting for room with the formless, nameless dread that had already claimed that space for its own.

  
He had terrible dreams. He told Ella he couldn’t sleep properly, but only after very nearly nodding off during one of their session. It had been awkward, but his head had hurt so he hadn't the energy to care about that at the time. He told her then that he didn’t want to sleep. That he wakes up feeling half-asphyxiated, or as if the entire building is collapsing. And the content of his dreams: it tormented him. Even when it wasn’t a nightmare.

Even when it was just the two of them, doing something mundane together. Even when it was just a memory of a case Sherlock had solved in under a minute - no gunfire, no blood. No sense of danger, simply an afterthought of contentment—though it wasn’t like watching the past through a telescope, it was like being alive. It was like being awake with him, wearing rose-tinted glasses. And it was heavenly. But even then, coming out of it, he felt haunted, he felt harrowed. (This part he had left out.)

For a long moment she had sat silently considering him, and jotted down a few notes for show that he didn't bother to read. Then, seemingly changing the subject, she had asked him how his writing was going and he regretted ever meeting her. She hadn’t prescribed him any drugs (maybe she thought it unsafe) - she had merely suggested that he write about it. That was all. It was the sort of advice his grandmother might have offered if ever she had had the opportunity. The amazing thing about that was, that his grandmother never did get her degree in psychology. Or in anything at all, for that matter.

He wasn’t sure if he had expected Ella to suddenly pull out all the stops - not exactly, but he had definitely expected something. Something he could mull over in quiet disgruntlement and then later on in the evening refuse to go through with. That sort of thing. Like sleeping pills. Or ECT.

He should have gotten a new therapist a long time ago, that much was clear to him.

  
People in general were very keen on giving him advice. People he had only just met, who approached him like you would a skittish animal in a petting zoo. They all presented themselves as if they had a lot of experience in what he was going through. All he could answer with was a tight smile and a mumbled 'Yes, I’ll definitely think about it.' And if he was being particularly polite he might have added a steely _'thank you'_ before being on his way, like the skittish animal he was. The more outrageous suggestions put forth involved an isolation tank, a medium, and dolphins. Great for anxiety. Great for closure. Great for depression. Just great.

In the pub, where John was unlikely to abandon his fodder and skitter off, Bill told him he should start running. Great for clearing your head, he said. And John found that he liked the thought of that. The thought of not thinking. Because even as he lost himself in one of his regular thousand-yard stares he felt like he was obsessing over something. Like an idea was clawing at him, trying to reach cognizance.

“You’ll get in shape. And the endorphins will cheer you right up.”

“What're you talking about? I’m in great shape. I look amazing,” John insisted. “And also - why do people persist in trying to find ways to _cheer me up_. It’s very thoughtful-” bloody annoying was what it was, ”but do I really appear that pathetic?” He put a lot of effort into looking the opposite of that, actually - obviously to no avail.

“You’re fine,” Bill said and clapped John’s shoulder so that he spilled his lager.

“Yes, as a matter of fact, I am,” he said, mostly truthfully, but even more so untruthfully, if he was being honest.

 

 

* * *

  
May, 2013

  
In the morning Sherlock left Mycroft’s place and visited his grave. He had given a brief thought to seeing his mother’s instead, but dismissed it just as swiftly. His mother could and (indubitably) would, wait.

There was an assortment of fresh flowers on it, like someone was plucking the withered leaves off it on an hourly basis. No doubt Mycroft had a man for that. Mycroft had a man for everything useless. Now, getting a good look at it, he found that he quite liked the black stone - the blackness, and the shine of it. Maybe they would let him keep it there, like a plaque. (Would John disapprove of that?) They probably wouldn’t.

He pulled his coat off, placed it on the ground and sat down on it. He ran the inside of his hands across the grass and tried to think of anything but lying in a coffin. He was above ground, and somewhere on the other side was Mary, (was this what victory felt like?) He tried to think of John but could only see the back of his head, could only hear magpies chirping incessantly.

He took the flowers John had left: he had known at sight which ones they were.

  
He had woken up that day feeling bereft of something. He felt lighter - as if he had shrunk from the inside and outwards - and dazed as though coming off a bad high. His thoughts seemed to exist outside the perimeter of his body. All the rooms in his head were quiet.

He travelled in circles and curlicues around Baker Street. As if daring fate to let them happen upon each other in a moment of him thoughtfully studying the pavement. He left tiny pieces of purple petals in his wake: shredding the symbol of eternal sleep so that John might know, that he had barely slept at all since leaving. (Stupid. John would never see them. John was nowhere to be happened upon.)

He went to the Grant Museum and looked at the specimens (a bunch of moles stuffed into a jar, pickled pig embryos, a sponge crab with a bowtie...) along with a class of schoolchildren and a pair of tourists; most of whom squawked and yelped at the sight of animal remains in yellowed fixative, the tourists in particular. He had been to it quite a few times before, most often with his nanny - once with his mother, which had appeased no one. But that was of course when it was still in the Darwin Building across the street. It had been much larger then and he remembered enjoying it much more over there (more than he had ever admitted to his vapid nanny) - but then, he himself had been much smaller, which might have accounted for either, or both, sensations.

He left within fifteen minutes: breathless, overcome with the incoherent fear that his gaze would suddenly land upon his own handiwork, or parts of it, in one of the Victorian curiosity cabinets or a glass case of formalin. (A severed hand with painted fingernails, a mutilated eyeball, pieces of a crushed kneecap.) The children had quietened down. They looked at him with stares as blank as the taxidermal birds and apes. The tourists had disappeared.

He stumbled out of the doors, onto the street. For a time he wandered aimlessly without any conscious intent and without really perceiving his surroundings. Abruptly he found himself amongst residential buildings in Islington and with no recollection of how exactly he had ended up there. Had John been there he might have scrutinised Sherlock’s wan face and told him to go home and sleep it off. And it was good advice (even as he took the shape of a hypothetical), if either action had been a possibility. Still unsure as he was, if he had a home, while knowing certain things - things he had done, things that followed him around like a flock of screeching raptors - couldn’t be erased by sleep.

He continued on east, having decided to go to the house where his violin teacher had lived two decades ago, inexplicably determined to see more places of his childhood; perhaps to find out if it could stir something within him. Reattach him. As conceivable as putting the smoke back into a cigarette through the act of respiration. As easy as retracing his footprints in a body of water.

The air was soil, the city mycelium, and he a squirming, severed filament. He felt nothing but displacement when viewing the white facade of the house in question. He didn’t hear any music.

  
In the night he walked along the Thames and knew he couldn’t stall any longer. His feet were sore and clumsy, his body ached. But that didn’t move him. His mind had remained fixed in an unchangeable state throughout the day, disjoined from any physiological experience. And his path had been clear to him from the very outset - as in, he knew where it began and where it would end.

He walked under lanterns on Gerrard Street and people moved past him like air, then dissolved into the shadows. All the way to Regent’s Park, where he became a shadow too; in moonlight stillness, while the moon was hidden. The roses were furled and slept in their beds in Queen Mary’s Garden and he was nearing the end of the path. He felt it like the anticipation of danger: his body thought the most rational thing would be to turn in the opposite direction. He aligned himself with John’s footsteps from 32 months ago, defying any primeval instinct to flee.

 

 

*

  
London has changed as it always does; growing older as it becomes newer - evolving, deconstructing, rebuilding itself around antiquated roads. (You were only away for 19 months: you're already ancient.)

And you've changed too but you've been away, you're out of step. The same streets are still there and in the same places, you still know all of their names. (They don’t know yours. No one does.) You never had any roots here, it was no more than a delusion. This city was never connected to you through a cannula in your arm, it was never in your veins. The only thing it ever gave you was something to hold onto; so that you wouldn’t float away. You’re a spectre looking for something to inhabit. A city, a body, a bed. You’ve always known precisely where to find it. And now you only need to surrender at his feet. It’s so simple.

All you have to do is travel half the remaining distance at a time. (But then you’d never arrive. It’s some sort of paradox, isn’t it?)

You’re outside the door.

You’re only half a distance apart from him.

 


	2. The Luminiferous Aether

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's a pun.

  
March, 2012

  
Everywhere it’s green, and in patches shrouded by a hazy gloom. Somehow it reminds me of Church in the summer. (Maybe it’s the way light filters through cluster upon cluster of leaves and branches; in my mind it makes for the exact same degree of illumination as those church windows did during confirmations.) I can vaguely remember having visited these woods as a little boy, playing and exploring here, along with some other unsupervised child. Or a place like this: places like this. Places that melt into each other after thirty years or so of no revisit, become one and the same.

But I don’t have the faintest idea anymore who it was I used to play with here, who fits into this memory. (Still don’t.)

I know you are here though. It makes sense. (Is that where you go when you die? Into the wilderness of someone’s memories. Incongruous as never before, yet managing to hide in the foreground. Sounds like something you could pull off.)

I know you’re somewhere close. Hidden under brier and nettles. I walk without direction under towering trees, and wonder: _will he come?_

(I think just that, over and over again. But did I ever find you? I don’t think I did. Sometimes I uncover you under heaps of sand and that's worse - you're never more out of place than in the desert. But worse yet are my dreams of London. They have none of the distant past’s tranquility. I wake up convinced I must've died in the night,  resuscitated come morning.)

*

  
Another vacant day broke on the street outside John’s window. The noise of the living began anew, and he felt very far up from it all. The flat was quiet and oppressive, the outside world harassed him. Somewhere in the kitchen his phone was vibrating but he chose to ignore it in favour of staying still. It was most likely unimportant: Bill, asking if he had changed his mind yet. (Which he hadn’t. Wouldn’t.)

“A fancy dress party?” Sherlock would have said with a look of disdain. “How _wildly_ entertaining…”

John mulled that over. Those words, in Sherlock’s voice. The facial expression. (Furrowed brow, wrinkled nose maybe?) He wondered if Sherlock had ever gone to a costume party as kid. If he had gone as a pirate. (But who would have invited him?) He wondered if he could have convinced Sherlock to go with him, if he had been sitting across from him right now. He had loved his elaborate disguises, there was no arguing that. And that was pretty much what a fancy dress party was - an investigation done incognito, only not prompted by a gruesome murder but a gruesome will to socialise. And that would have been the root of the issue, should John ever have attempted to drag him along. (He would never have come.)

He decided then that that was all the brooding he was going to do about Sherlock for today. He had met the quota. Nothing would get done if he didn’t stop himself in time.

There had been a change in their dynamics since Sherlock had elected to blow off the tedium that was existence.

“And I don’t mean to say by the absence of it, as I’m sure you’re about to suggest,” John wanted to say to no one, but didn’t.

Sherlock seemed to have taken on John’s role, and followed him around most of the day. John could find innumerable, creative ways to distract himself (alcohol, television, sleep), but Sherlock still stayed veiled in his shadow, whether John wanted him to or not. Of course, it was only the idea of Sherlock. The concept of him. And it annoyed John to have him reduced to that, because he was never a carefully constructed doctrine of logic and analysis and deduction; he had been greater than that. In addition to all his splendour and callousness, he had been undeniably human. And John would much rather reminisce about those moments, the times he had showed some humility, or humour, or vulnerability even - instead of thinking of things he might have said, or might have done, had he ever been presented with the bleak daily life John was now slowly being crushed under. Not make up lines for him to say like he was merely a character for the blog.

He considered the apple on the coffee table, he considered the bread on the counter and the eggs in the fridge. He was so very hungry, and eating was so very much a chore. Eventually he took a knife and cut the apple up in smaller and smaller pieces, somehow making it more bearable to get down.

  
He went for a run and tried to focus on the most far-off point in his line of vision, moving up and down streets full of potential reminders. Inducing tunnel vision. Thinking only of his own breath rasping in and out of his lungs; trying to make it a bit farther, a bit faster.

After an hour he had exhausted himself and had to walk most of the way back. But exhaustion was nice, it was the whole point. He could walk with his eyes mostly shut, he could focus on the hunger, the dizziness, the ache in his leg (he didn’t limp: not noticeably.) Exhaustion was the bliss of his new reality.

“What are you doing here?” he asked Bill who stood outside his door - waiting around like an excommunicated housecat when John reached the top of the stairs. He was not at all in shape for polite conversation, soaked in sweat and feeling like his legs might give out after climbing the four flights of stairs to his floor. (The lift was out of order: John had yet to witness it in any other state.)

“Hello!” Bill said and grinned. “I was just about to call you. Have you been out jogging? Following doctor’s orders, that’s good.”

“You’re a nurse,” John pointed out unnecessarily and unlocked his door.

“Can I come in for a bit?”

“Actually, I was just going down to the shops,” John lied, because he absolutely could not spend time with Bill at this very juncture without a drink or three in him, and it was still, ostensibly, too early to suggest they hit the pub.

“I’ll go with you,” Bill said, still pleasant despite John’s quite blatant dismissal of him.

“I need to shower first though, I might be awhile,” John said in a last-ditch attempt to passively tell Bill to shove off.

“Best that you do, probably - I’ll just have a cuppa and wait for you. I need to pick up some milk, anyhow,” he explained at length as he headed inside, and John could do nothing but follow in defeat.

“Oh, are you sure you don’t want to join me in the shower though?” John muttered as he shuffled to the bathroom.

“What’s that?” Bill called out from the kitchen.

“Nothing!” John called back.

 

“John?” Jeanette said at his side as he was making a careful study of a green potato, speculating on whether or not you could kill someone with a full serving, (perhaps if they were really, really hungry.)

“Hi…” John said meekly, upon seeing another excellent reason for never leaving the flat again.

“How are you? How have you been?” Jeanette said, a wide-eyed look on her face.

“I’m good. I’m... fine. How’re you?”

“I heard about… Um. I mean, I’m so sorry, John. Really.”

“Yes, well.”

“But you’re doing alright? That’s _great_ , that’s _lovely_. _Really great_.”

As John remembered it, she didn't use to be in the habit of constantly emphasising her adjectives unless if it was to express how shite something was. Particularly John’s treatment of her, and later, mostly just John in general. Now she seemed… changed. He didn’t know precisely in what manner: she looked the same as she had when they were dating. Maybe she was happier. (She wasn’t wearing so many dark colours anymore—was that telling of something?)

“So, you live nearby then?” John said, after an uncomfortable pause where he couldn’t think of a relevant response. “It’s just that I’ve not seen you in here before.” And further, he would need to find a new Tesco to get his groceries from if that was the case.

“No, no…” Jeanette said, as if she wouldn’t even dream of such a thing. “I’m almost never here. It’s just that my husband’s parents live in this neighbourhood - poor old things. I’m just picking something up for tea later.”

“Right. Okay.” Good, he almost added. Crisis averted. “So you’re married now, congratulations.” He tried to sound cheerful but succeeded mostly in sounding sarcastic.

“Yes, I am.” She beamed at him, raising her left hand to wiggle her fingers and show off the sparkly diamond she wore—then chuckled to herself, before hiding her complacency behind a sombre expression. John was almost entirely sure she was still cross with him, but that she thought herself too graceful to acknowledge it.

“You know,” she said and her face lit up again - but in such a foreboding way, John nearly took a step back. “I’ve got someone _lovely_ to set you up with. Wouldn’t that be _great_? We’re supposed to meet tonight at this, ah, thing. You have to come along! Trust me, he’s _gorgeous_. Just your type, I’ll bet.”

John didn’t really know where to start. She was definitely still mad. He wanted to drop his groceries, turn around and take to the woods. They stared at each other for a long-drawn moment; Jeanette with her blinking, feigned innocence - John with his panicked discomfiture.

“That’s all very nice, but I can’t actually. I’m busy.” And as she didn’t look convinced in the slightest - in fact, he was met with even more mock-ceremony of grief - he added, “I’m going to a party.” He felt the barest hint of satisfaction as she raised both eyebrows in mild surprise. He hadn't gone to parties with her. It was one of his grave offences. She had been very keen on parties. ‘Little gatherings’, she had liked call them - like the diminutive somehow made it sound more exclusive. The only party they had ever attended together was the one held by him (and Sherlock, officially - but who had fallen for that?) in his own flat, with people she had barely heard of before, and it had ended with her dumping him. (Much like all his other romances had ended during that period of his life. The Sherlock Period.)

“You changed your mind? Good lad,” Bill said, as he came up behind John. He felt the colour drain from his already washed-out face and realised he should have banked on his first instinct.

“Ah, I see,” Jeanette said as if now understanding something implicit, glancing between Bill and John. He couldn’t tell if she was pleased, believing her half-formed suspicions confirmed, or delightfully disgusted with the entire situation.

“What? No, we’re not-” John started, out of habit more than anything.

She smiled at Bill who obliviously did the same. “And how did you two meet?”

“We met in the army - we were stationed together in Afghanistan. I’m Bill, by the way.”

“Aw! How romantic!” she gushed, tilting her head at John. “Jeanette,” she said then, and shook Bill’s hand.

“Not really that romantic,” Bill said, sounding increasingly confused.

“Well, I’ll leave you two to it then,” Jeanette said, clasping John’s arm.

Leave them to what, John wondered and couldn’t help but grimace at her.

“It was so _nice_ seeing you, John.” She gave his arm a little squeeze before she went.

“ _Horrific_ seeing you too,” John wanted to say. Instead he gave her a rigid impression of a smile just as she turned smartly on her heel and strutted off.

“Oh! She thought-” Bill said when she had disappeared behind some shelves, not too quick on the uptake.

“Yes.”

“So you’re coming to the party then? That’s great. I’ve got the perfect costume for you to wear.”

“I’m not wearing a costume,” John said but resolved to follow through on the rest. Maybe he would meet someone there who didn’t assume they knew a single thing about him.

He could dream.

  
John wore his stethoscope. It was the full extent of his costume. People raised their eyebrows in half-amusement, half-disgust, when he answered to what it was he did for a living. There were a lot of young people at this party, they had all taken their costumes quite seriously, and yet the party-goers of his own age group had managed to commit with even more zeal. It was a very odd amalgam of people, and it made for an even odder atmosphere. Like a classy mixer combined with an orgy: any course of action could end up in either a riot or a game of Trivial Pursuit. With stealth he downed as many drinks as he could in a row, while trying to maintain a semblance of propriety in view of the (completely uninterested) room - to a larger degree, it was a trick he did to fool himself into thinking he wasn’t developing a problem. He was getting pretty good at it, too.

Bill had introduced him to the host and hostess and earned his place in their good graces until the novelty wore off, about three and a half minutes later, when John had disappointed them with his painfully bland replies to what life was like as the (once) great crime chronicler. They didn’t mention Sherlock by name. They spoke around him, his absence glaring in every other sentence - subtly taking in John’s reaction as they did. He had to excuse himself, thankful that Bill let him slip away without running after. He found a spot to sit after some searching, but it was next to a couple somewhat overly fond of each other: too fond for him to stomach sitting beside them very long. The thought of what a massive mistake he had made to set foot outside his door today echoed in his head as he went looking for a place to hide.

  
In the room opposite the front entrance Bill had thrown their coats atop a bed already supporting a mountain of outdoor clothing. There were no people in there now that John peeked inside from behind the door, so he decided to seclude himself there for a bit. He pushed at the many coats and jackets and perched himself on the edge of the bed, head in hands. He became aware, belatedly, that he had managed to lose his stethoscope, meaning he was now only a man in an old button-up shirt in a crowd dressed to the nines, tens, elevens and beyond. Very apt, but a grievance come Monday.

This was the first social event he had been to in months, and to his far-removed dismay, being affable - or whatever it was he was meant to be - hadn’t become easier. In all honesty he felt the same every day - still expunged of any and all gregarious traits he once had possessed, still becoming excessively annoyed with the idiosyncrasies of people he once might have found endearing, or at worst, not cared about at all. It was as though time had ground to a halt during the last half-year. Come autumn, his apathy had been replaced with an all-encompassing repugnance, and he seemed transfixed by it. He seemed to be stuck knee-deep in mud, the rest of his days laid out before him like a barren, soulless marshland. (Whenever he tried to call out to someone he found that he had lost his voice: they were too far away to hear his tired croaking.)

“Are you hiding too?” a low voice sounded behind him that made him flinch.

“Sorry, I didn’t think anyone was in here,” John said to the woman huddling on the floor at the other side of the bed.

She rose and straightened her attire. “That’s alright,” she said and sat down on the edge opposite him. “I can go if you want.”

“No, by all means, you were here first,” John said but made no move to leave. “...why were you hiding?”

She opened her mouth and inhaled, but closed it again as if no words would lend themselves to her. “I don’t know, I-” she said and turned her gaze downward, a little wrinkle forming between her eyebrows. “I just heard someone come in and was overwhelmed with the instinct to hide.” She looked up at John, and two seconds later covered her mouth to muffle insufficiently choked laughter.

“What were you doing?” John said somewhat suspiciously.

“Nothing!” she said with indignation, though it came out rather forced.

“You were definitely doing something you weren’t meant to.”

“How dare you! I was merely…” she trailed off and tried to adopt an air of nonchalance instead. “...putting chewed-up gum in the pocket of this one bloke’s jacket.”

“Right,” John said and tried not to overthink the weirdness of that.

She leaned forward to stage whisper in his direction, hand shielding her face as if there were actually anyone but the two of them present. “I’ve had a bit to drink.”

“First time?” he joked, though she seemed quite young so who knew.

“In a long time, yes.” She sat back again and studied his face for a while. “So are you a friend of the hosts?”

“Not really, no. Are you?”

“Not really.” She toyed with the fabric of her skirt. She was wearing a yellow dress, the colour brought vague impressions of flavours from some sweet, exotic fruit to his tongue. (Mango? Papaya?) He felt thirsty.

“So who are you here with then?” John asked her, partly to make conversation, partly to find out if her boyfriend was due to walk in on them any minute now. Not that it mattered to him. (Only, he wouldn't have declined a punch-up.)

“Oh, you know,” she sighed. “I came with a friend.” She said it as if it was a terrible cliché to her, attending parties with a friend. “I told her there’d be famous people here, I think she’s a bit disappointed. Not a single EastEnder... Free booze, though, she likes that.” She had made herself comfortable on the bed by this point, leaning against the headboard, legs crossed at the ankles and shoes dangling off her toes. She looked cold even in the warm glow of the bedside lamp right next to her. “The manchild who invited me, who’s probably still on the sofa chatting up that sexy redhead - who has a boyfriend already, by the way - he only just moved out of here.” She shook her head, tutting; she appeared more dejected than affronted though.

“Are you a bit jealous?” He meant only to tease her but must have annoyed her instead.

“No,” she said firmly, “It’s just a bit rude is all.” She gave him a quick glare and he winced. In softer tones she said, “I’m irritated. And alone. And a bit sad - that’s all.”

He cleared his throat, contemplating just how unsympathetic it would be of him to simply leave her to her misery. “Yeah, okay.” He couldn’t think of a pretense to walk off. “So am I, “ he confessed and watched the corners of her mouth twitch almost imperceptibly.

“Who did you come here with?”

“My friend.” He wondered if she thought him cliché as well, or if it was something specific to her life. “Bill.”

“Which Bill?”

“The inhumanly tall one who’s dressed in a slutty nurse’s outfit.” He was quite sure she would ask then, (“Are you  two…?”) only when she didn’t did he realise he was being paranoid.

“Oh, that Bill? I’m friends with that Bill, he’s brilliant,” she said.

“And the other Bill?”

“Complete bampot.”

John gave a soft laugh; they sat in silence and watched each other until it became palpably awkward.

“I should probably go see where he is actually. Keep him out of trouble.” He got up and moved towards the door.

“No, wait…” she said and he glanced back at her. “Can you maybe stay here for a bit? Keep me company? It’s just that-” She lifted one shoulder slightly, keeping her voice light but refusing to look up at him. “I feel so silly sitting here in the dark by myself.”

He thought about the party still going in full swing on the other side of the door, he thought about the terrible music and the terrible people. “Okay,” he said.

“I’m Mary.” She didn’t offer to shake his hand.

“John.”

“How do you know Bill?”

“We played rugby together,” John said, opting for the short version.

“Wow, an athlete.” She nodded slowly, pretending to be impressed; maybe trying to lighten the mood, smooth over her lapse of self-consciousness.

“Oh , I don’t play anymore. Well, I’ve taken up running. So… yeah. I’m quite athletic, still.”

“You can definitely tell.”

“Can you?”

“You’ve got the slender muscles of a long-distance runner.”

“I don’t look brawny?”

“No, no, you look positively hefty,” she said and he narrowed his eyes at her and thought he saw her blush. “How long since you started this ‘running’ business then? Do you do marathons and all that?” she said.

“Um… it’s been three weeks now, I think. No marathons yet. Do you run?”

“Oh, no.” She waved her hand derisively at the notion. “It’s much too tiring.” She leaned forward again, a few of her curls fell over her shoulder as she did; she made it seem as though she was about to mention something taboo. He noted the colour of her eyes then: they were brown, almond-shaped.“How often do you do it?”

“Let’s see here - these three weeks I’ve done it…” He made a great show of counting on his fingers. “Two times. Yes. I’ve done it twice so far.”

She laughed. It was a pleasant sound. “Well, you can tell anyway. You look dead fresh.”

“That’s basically the look I’m going for,” he shrugged, and felt a bit warm.

Mary drank about a third of a bottle of red wine once they dared to venture out into the kitchen, (John drank the rest.) She proceeded to eavesdrop on others' conversations and whisper conspiratorially to John whenever she believed them to be lying. Now and again she told him what she thought the truth was like, but it sounded more fantastical than real. She was proficient in talking nonsense, at least with some wine in her bloodstream.

“He’s never heard of that band before in his life, “ she said. “That’s not the reason she dropped out of uni. She’s following her dream of becoming a tap dancer.” They floated through the different rooms doing that, listening in keenly and not very discreetly; Mary studying the faces of conversers, John studying the face of Mary.

“Oh no, I know her type. You see she’s actually a successor to the throne of some European country or other, and having lived a very boring and isolated life, she seized her one opportunity to run away and experience the marvels of London, if only just for a day.”

“You are so full of-” John said and she shoved him hard.

“Language! You’re in the company of royalty.”

Somehow, as the festivities began winding down, they ended up outside, sans jackets, half-heartedly jitterbugging to muted dubstep music. They moved around each other very slowly, making bad, phlegmatic impressions of energetic dance moves. Mary swayed unsteadily and clutched at her chest with one hand, lightly clasping and unclasping John's hand with the other.

“It’s freezing!” she told him, as if he possibly could have been unaware.

“I think you’re clad a bit too optimistic for this climate zone.”

She shrugged and followed it up with some twirls. “You’re the doctor.”

“And you’re the…” He scrutinised her outfit. There was nothing else to it, just a puffed up, yellow dress that made her look as though she was to be the bridesmaid in a gaudy wedding ceremony. “What _are_ you supposed to be?”

“I’m sunshine,” she said, affectedly dramatic.

She drew nearer, closer than he would have her, she put her arms around his neck. It felt unprompted, yet he'd had his precognitions (hopes?) about it. He knew what she was about to suggest but he didn’t know with what to respond. There was no one in the shadows watching them. (Dead men did not get jealous.) All bets were off. Her gaze trailed from his eyes to his lips and back up; she looked at him from under her eyelashes, (she was an inch shorter than him, it looked quite effortless.) His palms rested against her waist; she was shivering very slightly in the raw night air.

“Will you take me to yours?”

  
* * *

  
May, 2013

  
He wore a new disguise. Always a combination of the same props. New hair colour, new eye colour, prosthetic facial hair, a pair of horn-rimmed spectacles - not overly elaborate this time. For convenience sake his hair had seen a colourshift starting with peroxide blond, progressively darkening, leaving it black for this last fix. He looked ten years his senior, but still the most like himself in years. It didn’t matter. The CCTV would be off. There would be no witnesses. There was only one possible informant at this place, and she was the target.

She would need to think she was in control, she would need to underestimate him. Those were the conditions for things to run smoothly. If possible, and he was counting on it to be, he would simply dump her with Mycroft. Let him deal with the goddamned clean-up, just like he wanted. Sherlock wouldn’t have to kill her then, (he quite desperately wanted to skip that part.) And he was not in good shape (he admitted that in a very remote recess of his brain) even though he ought to have been by now, so it suited him fine to be mild-mannered this once.

He sat in her office tapping his foot erratically against the floor, waiting for her to arrive. Sat and stared, got up, rifled through her drawers - found nothing of interest and sat down again to continue staring. Drummed his fingers against the desktop; sighed, in spite of himself. The important thing was to not lose focus, to not indulge in phantasmal conversations or reveries, no matter how obstinately it was brought to the forefront of his mind; so vibrant it threatened to burst out of his skull. Stay in control: stay present.

The walls had a couple of paintings on them. Some were signed _M.K._ \- she had painted those herself. One of Florence skyline; one of a foetus in utero; and one of Eidyia, sitting by a spring amidst overgrown ruins (only decipherable because she had planted the name as a reflection in the water.)

None of them had been hung with pride or love of art - they were clinical in tone, pictures of pictures. Florence was lines upon lines, detail after detail, and nothing more. The foetus was more lifeless than an image in a medical textbook. Eidyia wore a blank, unseeing expression as she stared into the spring, into her own name. She was a show-off, Dr. Kinney. She strove to best all and sundry. If she partook in any activity, she did it to win: as with her paintings (only her most technically ambitious were put up) as with the weekend golf (two right hand gloves still in their packaging, in the bottom drawer: she practised, she went through them fast) as with the cello playing (newly purchased baby powder on the desk for the pegs: she didn’t have children.) If she couldn’t win, she didn’t partake.

Her obsession with status was evident in past indiscretions, if nothing else. After her divorce she had boosted her finances by dipping into some hospital funds (there were also a pattern of maltreatment that may or may not have been financially motivated, but it was too vague to be conclusive.) That was nine years ago, when she still worked at a public hospital. Now she had moved up quite a way, and not only in the world of medicine if his sources were correct.

 

“Hello Madeleine,” he said as she entered her office.

“I’m sorry, do you have an appointment?” Kinney said, though she knew he didn’t.

“Please, have a seat.” He gestured to her chair.

She hid her irritation behind a temperate smile.

“Sir, if you would like to book an appointment, you can speak with my secretary-”

“I think you know why I’m here.” He nodded towards the chair again. “Sit down.”

She did, resting her folded hands on the desk.

“I’m sure I don’t,” she said, looking him straight in the eye. She wore her hair in a ponytail, and makeup that aimed for a look of _natural_ beauty (a women's magazine's fantasy of natural beauty.)

“I’m in need of some information,” he began, tilting his head down a bit as he met her gaze. “In return, you’ll get to go home, pack a few things and leave the country without any fuss. We’ve even set up a little house for you, new identity included in the price. I’ve seen it, it’s lovely - the house, I mean. But the identity too, I’m sure.”

Her expression had gone from calm to fully incommunicative. She was ruminating over what he had just told her, and thereupon every illegal or disloyal act she had ever carried out; he could just about see the list glazing over her eyes.

“All I need is a fair amount of cooperation. It’s a good offer,” he assured her.

“And if I can’t provide?” Her voice had lost most of its dulcet inflection, she stared off over his shoulder.

“I have faith in you.” Sherlock smiled at her; a mirror image of her earlier demeanor. “I think you’d prefer it this way. My colleagues’ interviewing techniques are much less... verbal, than mine is, if you understand my meaning. And you’ll need full use of your fingers to play the cello, won’t you?”

She raised her eyebrows slightly. “Quite,” she said.

  
She didn’t know a Sebastian Moran, but she recognised the photograph even though she said it looked hardly anything like him, (there were only a few select patients of hers it could have been.) He went by the name of Merton with her, she had treated his AVM for four years running.

“When was the last time you saw him?”

“About two months ago.”

“Be specific, please.”

She didn’t need to look through the records to know, she had an answer ready for him. “March 15, 11:30 PM.”

“And how do you get in contact with him?”

“I don’t.”

“I’m sure there’s some way.”

She paused, only for a second, before conceding. “If it’s very urgent, I leave a voicemail.”

“I want you to do that right now.”

“And tell him what?” Kinney scoffed. “He’s fine.”

“Oh, don’t play coy now, Madeleine. You’ll think of something.” He looked at his wristwatch. “I’ll give you… five minutes. Then we really must be going.”

  
She had her car in the underground car park, he had scoped it out earlier. They took the stairs. It was nearly noon and activity was running low; they met two other medics on their way, (an orderly, then a radiographer) but neither one acknowledged them. About halfway down Kinney had slowed considerably, clutching the bannister tightly as she went.

“Are those heels getting the better of you?” Sherlock asked her, pretending not to know how much a remark like that would irk her.

“I might need my inhaler.”

He hesitated to give it to her, thinking it might be to his advantage to have her a bit starved for oxygen, but ultimately he didn’t have time, nor patience, for her to limp her way down the rest of the stairs at a pensioner’s pace.

She remained with her back to him as he rummaged through her bag (which he gentlemanly had insisted on carrying - not fooling her for a second, of course); once found, he gave it a quick inspection and slight shake before placing it in her upturned, clammy hand. She breathed it in once, deeply, making a slight slurping noise - then waited for a minute; they continued their descent.

  
He wasn’t prepared for the blow. She turned around with one hand pressing down on the door handle of the exit, and sprayed him with the inhaler then, still clenching it, struck the side of his head as he turned away. For a second he thought it was some type of lachrymatory agent, but she had aimed only for his mouth. The fact that his face wasn’t dissolving completely was also a relief, he realised in succession.

She disappeared through the door, and when he came after her six seconds later she was nowhere in sight. A discarded pair of pumps was all the trace she had left. (If she ran he would still catch her.)

The substance tasted foul and pungent on his tongue; he put his glasses away in his trench coat and wiped his face with his sleeve. He cupped his hands in front of his mouth and nose, exhaled and sniffed - a cocktail with diethyl ether.

She really had managed quite an impressive punch - his head throbbed and there was a loud ringing in his ear. No blood though. He took a few cautious steps in the direction of her car, all the while listening for the sounds of footsteps, of doors unlocking.

But there were none.

She was exceptionally quiet. Or maybe it was the ringing that drowned her out. He had readied the syringe and placed it between his lips so as to keep his hands free (which had begun to feel thick and itchy, like carbon dioxide ran through his bloodstream) - when she stepped out behind him and kicked his right knee pit: bringing him down mid-stumble with the entirety of her body weight on his back. The syringe went flying as he hit the ground and something wrapped around his neck to cut of his air supply.

This wasn’t his first time being strangled, he knew from experience how long he had before he would lose consciousness. He had been able to fit his fingers under whatever it was she was using as ligature before it was tugged taut, and he tore at it without much success; his other hand reaching into his pocket. He noted distantly, from the steady, methodical way she was pulling the chokehold tighter, straddling him as she was, that she seemed rather unfazed by the whole procedure. He guessed that even her heart rate remained level.

He had made a mistake. He had been careless, inattentive, (a bloody _idiot_.) She wasn’t a small time embezzler, a doctor of questionable ethics - she was a sociopath. She had killed before, and not by accident or in self-defense. He had been staring at a reflection of himself, seeing nothing.

Idiot.

Landing on the ground, he had felt the pocket knife press against his hipbone, and wrapping his fingers around it inside the coat pocket only one of the tools would flick open; it wasn’t the knife. She leaned in - simultaneously dragging him further towards her - and told him sweetly, “I know who you are, Sherlock Holmes.” He felt her breath in his hair. She pulled at his noose. It wouldn’t be long now. His muscles were rapidly weakening, his vision was blurring. (He had an urge to call out John’s name.)

With his adrenalin reaching the summit that precedes the never-ending drop - the final surge before complete surrender -  he drew his hand out from under himself, and as he twisted around he could see the side of her head: the blond ponytail, the silver hoop earring.  His elbow just barely grazed her chin before the corkscrew on the pocket knife was buried in her neck.

She released her hold of him with a low and gurgling gasp. A warm splatter landed across his face, droplets running down his neck, under his shirt. The corkscrew slid out of her throat as she toppled over; in his fingers he felt every little hitch as the unevenness of the helix snagged ever so slightly on slippery tissue. Her hands reached for her neck but soon became too weak to press against the flow of blood.

This was a mess.

He laid next to her, drawing one wheezing breath after another as hers abated into nothingness. After a while she had stilled completely. He watched her through heavily lidded eyes, disparate thoughts, (somehow there was an inch of air between him and the ground.) He had just killed someone in the plain light of day - anyone could come down there and see them at any given moment. Anyone could have seen them in the act. Kinney wouldn’t have minded one bit: she would have screamed and cried and told them about the man who tried to abduct her.

He chuckled quietly to himself, but couldn’t really pinpoint a reason. If he were fifteen years younger he might have cried. He thought he felt fingers comb lightly through his hair. He thought he heard John humming.

He had to sit up abruptly to dry heave. The nausea and sleepiness was taking over - he shook himself into action. One of Kinney’s legs was bare, the missing stocking was hanging off his shoulders. He tied both around her neck to keep the wound from dripping. He rolled her up in his trench coat and put her in the boot of her car (half-inside the unzipped golfbag.) There wasn’t anything to soak up the blood with, and the stain would be obvious enough anyway without the use of chemicals. He decided to work open the drain cock on the nearest car and let the petrol cover it for the time being. Maybe an unsuspecting cleaner would do the work for him, without ever realising. Maybe. If it was an extraordinarily good cleaner.

  
Kinney had a house in _the leafy part_ of the suburbs, an hour drive away from the clinic. He drove as fast as he could without drawing attention to himself.

“What are you going to do about the body?” John asked him from the passenger seat.

“I don’t know. I’ll think of something.”

“Well, you can’t bury her.”

“And why not?”

“They’ll find her.” He sounded certain, and Sherlock knew he was right. It couldn’t be anywhere near her house, and he couldn’t be seen driving anywhere but her normal routes.

“I said I’ll think of something.”

Her house was at the end of the street, a bit off the road. The interior design had been chosen to convey her intrinsic sophistication: modern, baroque, lots of white to offset the dark. She had artifacts of cultures from all over the globe; she had jars of sand that looked grey and dusty, artfully displayed on her windowsills. He knew the type. He knew what it was meant to spell out to guests. The elegance, the worldliness - the neat perfection.

Her basement was a different story.

He flicked the light switch and in a pool of illumination, in the centre of the room, stood an operating table. He turned on all the lights and the rest of her equipment was hit by unforgiving fluorescence. On the wall next to the door was a hook with a bunch of keys hanging off it; he took them down and pressed their jagged parts into his palm. In the far corner was placed a refrigerator meant for a single body in a morgue. Perpendicular to it was an open freezer belonging in a grocery store. (Not as stylised as the upper floors, but she probably never held parties in this room.) The fridge felt warm, he knew it would be empty; he still held his breath as he opened it. He didn’t feel like looking into the freezer. It was turned off as well, no buzzing coming from it, no cool air surrounding it. He couldn’t smell rotting, only bleach. But crouching down he could see a thin feeding tube lying forgotten on the linoleum floor, just barely sticking out from under the freezer. It had been used recently, she must have been in a hurry to dispose of its user, probably just before leaving for work that morning.

He couldn't be completely sure without picking it up, but from what he could tell it was too short to have been intended for an adult.

She didn’t keep trophies, none that he could see anyway, but she did keep an entire bookcase full of notebooks. He didn’t touch those. He didn’t really want to know. Not today. He jangled the keys in his hand, wondering what to do next. There was an emblem of St. Nicholas Church hanging among the them, and a name tag that read: _Craig Richardson, Funeral Director_. An image of the jars on the windowsill blinked in his mind's eye like someone turning on a floodlight in pitch-blackness. He ought to have taken a closer look at them, (but didn't need to now.) He realised that he was already holding the solution to his problem, and it was to be the same one Kinney had used for all of hers.

He took her to the incendiary.

 

“Can I stay here tonight?” he said as greeting when late in the evening, Mycroft answered the door. He kept his tone monotonous, and tried to look like he was not, in fact, a second or so away from keeling over.  

“Certainly,” Mycroft said and stepped aside to let him in.

“You’ll need to pay the cab fare,” Sherlock told him as he made his way past him.

Mycroft sat down at the kitchen island with two cups of coffee - the cost of Sherlock’s coming castigation. _Quite_ inconsiderate of Mycroft, to lecture Sherlock on the gravity of following protocol and not getting himself killed through his own idiocy, when Sherlock had only just returned from completely disregarding protocol and having nearly died because of that very idiocy. But what could one expect?

“It’s a miracle you’ve made it this far,” Mycroft said with his usual dryness - the miracle being a euphemism for Mycroft himself, naturally. “They’ll disown you if you’re found out. They will throw you to the dogs, and I won’t be able to stop them.” He gave Sherlock a hard look that went by almost entirely unnoticed. He might have said a great many other things - actually, empiricism told Sherlock that it was a near-inevitability - but he had caught only glimpses of it.

They’d had this conversation many times before, it was starting to get ridiculous. That Mycroft hadn’t accepted things already was as embarrassing as it was trite. It was too late to wait around for permission. There wasn’t time for clandestine bureaucracy, or old men, long since mutated into office fixtures, to mull over the politics. He wouldn’t stand aside to let the errand boys stick their scummy little fingers in the mix, bring it all down through their incompetence or disloyalty.

“When they know what she’s done, they’ll pray she’s dead. They’ll hope it was painful.” And by _they_  he didn’t mean the SIS - they could care less about justice, the only thing that mattered to them was intel, (the clue was in the name.) What he needed was for the public to know about her depravity, and it would all work itself out from there. (Once Moran was dead just like all his pinioned friends.)

“You should have called me right away, let my people take care of the body.”

“It won’t be found.”

“What makes you so sure?”

“Because I’m not present to explain it to anyone. I’m still dead.” He pushed the plastic bag containing some notes he had written, along with Kinney’s passport, across the countertop to Mycroft. “I need you to do something about the parking garage,” he admitted with only minor difficulty. “Possibly the car as well.” He refused to look at Mycroft as he told him this, even still Sherlock was sure he was somewhere in the process of rolling his eyes. “Other than that you only have to see to it that two people matching the descriptions get on the earliest international flight possible. And have someone talk to the secretary the minute he steps out of his door tomorrow, he’ll have to keep up appearances,” he finished with the lofty tone of a mistress telling the staff what needed to be done around the house.

“If you say so, little brother,” Mycroft said, clearly having no intention whatsoever to blindly follow his instructions. But that was fine with Sherlock. He knew his brother would come to the same conclusion. He had little option but to follow through.

  
Later, Mycroft observed him silently from the drawing room entrance, as Sherlock paced the floor, mumbling to some unseen attendant between heaving sighs.

“You should get some sleep,” Mycroft told him.

Sherlock turned at the sound of his voice, lifted from another one of his trances; only then realising he had been watched.

“Do you want to play a game?” Sherlock asked, sounding five years old again and unwilling to go to bed.

Mycroft shook his head minutely. “Goodnight, Sherlock.”

  
*

  
You’re going back to where it began. You’re on your way, you’re almost there. So close you can almost see it behind closed eyelids. He’ll open the door: you’ll have returned to him, just like you’d promised when he couldn’t hear you.

He’ll ask: _What now?_ And you’ll tell him you’re going to finish this. _Then what?_ he’ll want to know, and you’ll say it’s over then. You’re done. Maybe you’ll crumble and disintegrate out of sheer exhaustion once it is. (Don’t think about it. It’s not over yet. Think about John.)

You’ll lean against him and he’ll lean against you. On the sofa, or on the bed. And you’ll resist your impulses, the need to clutch and inhale and kiss and all those myriad things. And maybe he’ll kiss you instead. Your neck, then your jaw; finally (maybe) your lips too. (Incogitable.)

Then you can touch him and pull moans like threads from his mouth, spun from smoke and incredible longing. Yours – both of you – mingled together. (Impossible)

And he’ll have forgiven you then.

And you’ll have become a good man, at last.

(Never.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I think I’ve made the timeline comprehensible now. Every chapter is divided (by this: “* * *”) into two parts: John’s POV (first) and Sherlock’s POV (second.) The events of Sherlock’s timeline are told in reverse order, but not John’s. Men vem kommer ens att läsa detta, herregudrun. Sämst.

**Author's Note:**

> To anyone who's read this far: well done! That is very impressive. And I'm sorry about this. I grow more nonsensical with each passing day. But I'm hoping, once it's done, that the entirety of it will have achieved some semblance of coherence. I also hope it'll be done before S4 but that seems even more improbable.


End file.
